Baillie will end Stephen McNeil’s sweetheart deal with former Liberal leader

March 16, 2017 at 12:03 pm

HALIFAX, NS – Progressive Conservative leader Jamie Baillie says that as premier, he will stand up for taxpayers and end ex-Liberal leader Danny Graham’s sweetheart deal with Stephen McNeil.

Baillie says it’s unfair for Mr. McNeil to tell everyone else to cut back, while signing off on wasteful spending for Engage Nova Scotia and its well-connected leader.

According to documents obtained by the PCs through a Freedom of Information request, former Liberal leader Danny Graham is receiving $13,584 a month – or $447 a day – in taxpayer funds to “engage” with Nova Scotians.

In 2015, Graham’s organization spent $566,692. Of that, $444,564 was from taxpayers.

Some of his organization’s major expenses include:

$220,136 on professional fees and consultations

$196,048 for in-kind secondments from the government of Nova Scotia

$30,181 for attitudinal research

$28,380 for in-kind downtown Halifax office space

Baillie says Premier McNeil’s priorities are backwards.

“Premier McNeil cut the food budget in nursing homes to less than $5 a day per senior, but he gives his Liberal friend Danny Graham $447 a day to research the ‘attitudes’ of Nova Scotians,” says Baillie. “That’s wrong. This is nothing more than a plum patronage job for another one of the Premier’s Liberal friends.”